Regency Romp 03 - The Alabaster Hip

by Maggie Fenton

  “Minerva, please forgive me.”

  Apparently, he didn’t. She wanted to hide behind her placard as all eyes began to turn in her direction.

  She supposed that many women would be flattered by the public declaration—by the high romance of the moment (especially the Misstophers, who were all glaring green daggers at her)—but all she could feel was a rising hysteria. What the devil did he think he was doing?

  He seemed to falter slightly after this, as if he’d lost the train of his thought—or had guessed her mood. She tried to command him with her eyes to stop, but he barreled onward after Montford and Manwaring gave him encouraging gestures from the sidelines.

  Well, at least now she knew who had put him up to this.

  Lady Elizabeth, who had looked smugly pleased by the viscount’s declaration at first, now looked between Marlowe and Minerva with growing alarm. “Oh, good grapes,” she muttered. “He’s cocking it up even more, isn’t he?”

  Minerva’s throat was too tight for her to respond at all.

  “Burn them if you must,” he said of the unholy pyre. “They’re all rubbish. Here is the only truth . . .”

  Oh, dear Lord. She covered her face with her hand.

  “‘I speak not, I trace not, I breathe not thy name,’” he began, though he had, in fact, just spoken her name. In front of the most judgmental biddies of the ton. On a stage. In Hyde Park. “‘There is grief in the sound, there is guilt in the fame; / But the tear that now burns on my cheek may impart / The deep thoughts that dwell in that silence of heart.’”

  She wanted to simultaneously sink into the ground, smack him across the cheek, and kiss him on the mouth. He was quoting poetry at her.

  Good Lord, he had finally cracked completely.

  Never in her wildest imagination had she ever dreamed of Lord Marlowe, of all people, reciting anything other than a bawdy limerick to anyone. Ever. But that was before she knew he was the most celebrated poet in the whole kingdom, wasn’t it? Here he was, unafraid and unabashed, speaking verse with an eloquence of tongue not even the smoothest of orators could have rivaled.

  She couldn’t help the flash of heat his earnest entreaty inspired inside, despite her general mortification. This would have been the point in the novel that the heroine would have fallen into the hero’s contrite arms, bowled over by the sheer romance of the moment. But she certainly didn’t feel like a heroine, and she . . .

  Well, she hated novels.

  And besides . . .

  Besides, he wasn’t even quoting himself at the moment. He was quoting Byron. Bloody Byron. And he knew—he knew how she felt about Byron.

  It was, to her, the last straw in a mountain of last straws. He couldn’t even be bothered to declare himself in his own words—he had to borrow someone else’s.

  She had complained to him last she saw him that she didn’t know who he was. Well, the inverse had been proven today—he knew her very little if he thought this public spectacle was going to earn him anything but another black mark.

  She wished she were the sort of girl who could ignore the grievances between them and the mortification she felt at being singled out in such a public venue, throw herself in his arms, and live happily ever after. But she wasn’t. All the eyes on her, in judgment or jealousy, made her skin crawl.

  “‘Too brief for our passion, too long for our peace . . .’” he continued, oblivious to her distress, and suddenly she couldn’t bear to hear another word.

  She dropped her picket and turned away from the stage, the fire, the whole preposterous production. Carefully avoiding meeting anyone’s eyes, she wove her way through the crowd and into the shrubbery, her only goal to hide until it was all over.

  As ill-conceived and unwanted as his public declaration was, though, it gave her a modicum of hope. Perhaps he did love her. Perhaps he could be interested in her for more than his mistress—but the hope was very small, indeed, for when it came down to it, how could he love her when he hadn’t even trusted her to tell her who he was?

  MEANWHILE, IN THE SHRUBBERY . . .

  JEM HIGGINS LOVED his wife—a rare occurrence indeed in this day and age. He also wisely loved the same things his wife did, including her sister, Jenny, who was still an employee of White House, a nunnery off Soho Square Jem’s wife had (mostly) left behind upon their marriage.

  At least, Jenny had been gainfully employed there—and surprisingly happy in her profession—until her last encounter with the Duke of Plagues, as Oxley was known fondly among the bawdy houses of St. Giles and Soho. That had not ended well, for now the poor girl was tucked up with Jem and his wife, too ill to get out of bed most days and suffering from something far worse than the cuts and bruises she had first received from that monster.

  It was for this reason that Jem found himself crouched in the shrubbery behind a mob of angry noblewomen, watching half the inventory of London’s bookshops burn to ashes as he awaited his quarry. Jenny needed a doctor, one of the proper ones who didn’t cut hair or pull teeth for a living—or brew up backroom potions that were more likely to kill than heal—and she would have had one with the blood money Oxley had been obliged to give them, if not for Petey Soames.

  He knew he never should have agreed to Soames’s scheme to “invest” the duke’s money at the races, but he’d always been hopeless when it came to saying no to his cousin. Granted, Jem hardly understood what the man was going on about half the time, but Soames always made it seem as if paradise awaited them both at the end, if only Jem would trust him just a little bit longer.

  One would have thought Jem might have learned better by now, but alas, Soames and his silver tongue were just as hard to resist as when the two of them had been children picking pockets in Covent Garden (or rather, when Jem had been picking pockets, and Soames had put himself in charge of guarding their take).

  Jem never thought he’d actually miss the days when his cousin’s schemes were of the more illicit variety. But Soames now fancied himself a reformed officer of the law, and the only halfway interesting thing the man did these days was strong-arm money from coves like Oxley and lay a few hopeless wagers at the tracks.

  That whole episode with the marchioness and her demon dog had left an impression on more than just his cousin’s ankles.

  Jem, however, couldn’t afford Soames’s new perspective on life, not with a wife and a sick sister-in-law to support. And if that meant finding a little side job to make up for the funds lost at Newmarket, then that was what he would do.

  The one upshot to working a job without Soames was that he wouldn’t have to split the proceeds . . . or be cajoled into another trip to the races even farther afield than bloody Suffolk.

  Soames had been the brains behind their little extracurriculars, however, and Jem wasn’t so sure what his cousin would have thought of the man who had hired him . . . or what he’d hired him for.

  Jem had never been involved in anything more nefarious than a bit of light house burgling, a few low-profile swindles, and the occasional blackmail scheme. The worst thing he’d done was that ill-fated dognapping that still had him jumping halfway to Hampstead Heath every time he heard a dog bark. He’d certainly never even considered abducting an actual human, yet that was what his current employer wanted. The prize—twenty pounds sterling—was rather too tempting to pass up.

  Besides which, his quarry was a rich nob, of the same caliber as the Duke of Plagues himself, and no doubt deserved a lot worse than to be abducted. Jem hadn’t the highest opinion of the Upper Ten Thousand. He’d spent too many nights standing guard at the White House doors to have little more than contempt left for its high-flying patrons.

  And honestly, anyone who’d spend good English coin at his tailor upon a silver jacket that hideous was committing a criminal act in Jem’s opinion. It was even worse than Soames’s ridiculous red waistcoats.

  He’d been following the nob in the silver jacket all day as he’d been instructed, waiting for just the right moment to snatch him.
But the bloody man had been annoyingly social today, rushing about the city with his cronies—one of which Jem recognized with no little alarm as the Marquess of Manwaring—and then attending that . . . whatever that was about in Hyde Park.

  Jem shook his head at the sight of the burning pyre beyond the shrubbery and the mob of highborn women milling around it as if they were at an afternoon tea. It was all inexplicably strange to Jem’s mind.

  When he was really short on funds during the winter, he’d pinch the occasional book to burn from old Geordie’s shop down on the corner, for a little added warmth in the stove. But he’d never heard of nobs burning books for fun, and he’d certainly never heard of nobs’ wives doing so in the middle of the day in Hyde Park.

  It seemed like something they’d do in France, though. The French, in Jem’s humble opinion, had a lot of strange habits he’d never understand, but he knew Englishwomen seemed to love them. Jem was beginning to suspect, however, that highborn females of any nationality were even more mystifying a breed.

  But this . . . this was a special kind of insanity. Jem couldn’t read, but he wouldn’t burn an Essex poem, even if it were the coldest day of the year, any more than he’d burn the Bard’s. His wife loved Essex, and he had taken to memorizing the man’s verse whenever he happened to hear it. Reciting “The Alabaster Hip” to the missus had led to many bliss-filled nights in recent memory.

  Jem could only conclude that the women intent on destroying such genius had never had a bliss-filled night in their lives.

  The nob in the silver jacket must have had the same idea, for he didn’t look well pleased as he took to the stage. Jem wasn’t well pleased either, for he had spotted his cousin, of all people, among the officers of Bow Street sent to keep the plebs away while the ladies had their bizarre little soiree.

  Jem didn’t dare move from the bit of shrubbery he’d found, in case Soames found him out before he’d done the job. The distance made it impossible to hear what his quarry was going on about after he’d all but knocked that old biddy off the platform and started speaking. But it couldn’t be good, considering the noise the crowd had begun to make.

  One particular lady—one of the sensible ones who seemed to be protesting the protest (though perhaps sensible wasn’t the right word)—didn’t seem a bit pleased with whatever the nob was spouting, however. She stalked off through the bewildered throng, past the fire burning high with books and broadsheets, and right toward where Jem crouched in the bushes.

  The nob ended his speech abruptly and started after her.

  The good news was that his quarry was now heading in his direction.

  The bad news was that so was the lady.

  Jem scratched his head at this conundrum.

  AND THEN, A FEW STEPS FROM JEM’S BIT OF SHRUBBERY . . .

  MINERVA DIDN’T GET far in the maze of greenery before Marlowe found her. She couldn’t say she was surprised he had followed her, but she was certainly in no mood to make things easy for him. For even if her initial anger had cooled over the past few days, it still smoldered in her heart. And this spectacle—as well intentioned as it seemed to be—had done nothing to win her over.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” he growled out to her, stepping in front of her in his ridiculous silver jacket. As if he had any right to be angry at her.

  “As far from you as I can get,” she muttered.

  He looked at her with frustration and hurt. “What the devil do you want of me, then?” he cried, spreading his arms wide. “What must I do to prove myself to you?”

  “Certainly not make a scene before half the ton,” she shot back. She tried to move around him, but he blocked her path. She huffed and walked in the other direction.

  “A scene?” he bit out as he stalked after her, his long legs quickly overtaking her once more. “Minerva, please! It was meant to be a Grand Gesture.”

  “For whom?”

  “I did it for you.”

  She snorted. “Unlikely.”

  He snarled at her and then did something unexpected. He seized her in his arms and crushed her against him, which was getting to be a bad habit of his. He glared down at her, eyes shining, breath ragged. “Do you know how hard that was for me? To declare myself in front of all of those people?” he bit out.

  She thought she might have some idea considering how jealously he’d guarded his secret for years, but he was holding her so tightly—and his body felt so good against her own—that she was quite at a loss to respond. She gave a little incoherent grunt, because that was all she could manage.

  “Do you know how you make me feel every second of every day, Minerva?” he asked.

  “No, actually, I don’t,” she said honestly. “I have no idea what you truly feel for me.” Which was entirely the problem.

  He looked startled by her words—incredulous. As if he couldn’t believe she didn’t know. Suddenly his lips covered hers, as if to prove something to her, and he was kissing her as if his life depended on it. It made her lips ache and her body turn from floundering noodle into fiery inferno in the space of a few seconds.

  Damn him. She gave a token struggle, but soon she was melting into his kisses. What choice had she when her body had turned into an inferno, after all? She twined her arms around his neck and held on for dear life as his mouth went to her ear and stayed there.

  “Do you know how much I want you, Minerva? To finish what we began the other night?” he murmured, clutching her around the back with one hand, the other traveling up her leg and under her skirt.

  She gasped. Was he going to . . . ? Dear God, Marlowe was going to ravish her right here, in the shrubbery. And she . . .

  She couldn’t allow it.

  She could forgive him for not telling her he was Essex. She probably already had. But during their time apart, she’d thought long and hard about all that had happened between them . . . and all that hadn’t.

  She wouldn’t regret the pleasure he’d brought her, but she’d been so hasty in her capitulation, so blinded by her physical attraction for him, that she’d ignored what had never been acknowledged between them. In all of the words spoken, all of their banter, arguments, and soul-baring over the past few months, neither one of them had ever spoken of love—except now, sort of, through borrowed verse. But it did nothing to assuage her doubts.

  To be fair, she hadn’t declared herself either, but how could she now, when he’d already laid her bare, stripped her to the bone?

  She didn’t doubt his regard for her on the physical level—he’d been attracted to her from the very beginning, hadn’t he? He’d called her a fey creature, which was about as unsubtle as one could get, now that she thought about it. But she was afraid his regard ended there, that he wanted her for a lover and nothing else.

  For some women—many women in a similarly precarious position as hers—that would have been a perfectly acceptable arrangement, but she was simply not built to be a mistress. She may have been a pragmatist about most things in life, but in matters of the heart, she was distressingly romantic.

  She wanted him to love her enough to marry her, despite their disparate stations in life, and if that wasn’t something he could offer her, then it was best they went their separate ways before they hurt each other even more.

  “No!” she said, pushing him away firmly. “This is not enough.”

  He looked confused and hurt by her rejection. “Then what will satisfy you? My heart on a spit?” he demanded, frustrated.

  “I won’t be your kept woman,” she bit out, finally acknowledging the elephant between them as much as she dared.

  He looked poleaxed by the declaration. “Kept . . . what are you talking about?” he cried, sounding utterly mystified.

  “I won’t,” she insisted, turning from him, unable to bear his bewildered, wide-eyed look. “It is not a life that could ever make me happy.”

  He spun her around to face him once more, and he looked down at her with an anguished expression. “How co
uld you ever think . . . Minerva, that is not what I want from you.”

  “Then what? What do you want from me?” she cried. “Because you’ve never told me.”

  It was as close to begging as she could get without completely losing her pride. Even so, she hated how pathetic she sounded.

  His expression softened, as if he finally—finally—understood her, and something like hope lit his big brown eyes. The knot of fear in her gut started to unravel a little at his gentle smile, and she began to hope as she had never let herself hope these past few days that he’d say the words she longed to hear.

  “You’ve never let me,” he retorted, without heat. “Minerva, I . . .”

  But the words never came. Just as Marlowe opened his mouth to speak, his gentle expression shifted into shock, and his eyes rolled into the back of his head. A moment later, he fell to the ground in a dead faint.

  It took her a while to overcome her own astonishment enough to piece together what had happened. She glanced from Marlowe’s unconscious body to the tall, bony ruffian standing over him with a rock in his hand. The ruffian’s eyes were popped wide, as if he too were surprised at how well his coshing had worked.

  She opened her mouth to scream, but the man lurched forward and clapped a filthy hand over her lips.

  “Quiet now, missy, or I’ll do for ye what I’ve done for him,” the man sneered.

  If he thought to frighten her, then he had another thing coming. Just when she was finally getting somewhere with Marlowe, this villain had to interrupt. And at perhaps the most crucial moment of her life. Did he have any idea how annoying that was?

  Powered by sheer exasperation, she managed to push him back and land a hard right hook to the ruffian’s eye, just as the captain had taught her. He yelped and staggered back, looking rather horrified at her show of aggression.

  It didn’t deter the man for long, however, for he soon made good on his threat and coshed her over the head, just as he’d done to Marlowe.

  And for a long time thereafter, she knew no more.